Mission statement: On this blog we explore why homeschooling can be a better option for children and families than a traditional classroom setting. We'll also explore homeschooling issues in general, educational thoughts, family issues, and some other random stuff.

Monday, September 08, 2014

The PEPSI reasons for homeschooling

In a high school history class I had a teacher say that when trying to understand why people did things, one framework to use was PEPSI which stood for Philosophical, Economic, Psychological, Social and Ideological. Often people are motivated by one or more of these.

Here are the PEPSI reasons we homeschool:

Philosophical: We believe that the primary responsibility of educating our children lies with us. Since public schools are doing such a poor job this alone would be enough of a reason to homeschool our children.

Economic: Homeschooling is an inexpensive way to get a quality education. The quality of American public schools has declined over the last several decades. There are still a few pockets of good public schools but they tend to be in expensive neighborhoods. So if you want your child in a good public school you often have to buy an expensive house. Another option is to send your child to a private school. Around where we live they have private schools ranging for $10,000 a year to as much as $40,000 a year. Homeschooling is much cheaper.

Psychological: We are very distrustful of our government. There are many groups with agendas the push into the government school curriculum. Some of these world views are harmful. When children go off to government schools you have very little influence in what they are taught.

Social: One of the few remaining concerns people voice about homeschooling is "What about socialization?" This is one of our main reasons to homeschool. Public schools are a horrible place for children to learn appropriate, mature responses to social situations. Too often thirty students with a teacher is more of a Lord of a the Flies situation than a setting for learning adult responses for social interaction.

Ideological: In some ways this brings us back to where we started. We believe that God will hold us accountable for how our children are educated. We want to make sure our children are well taught, in all areas that they need, academic, social, their own character and so on.